Birth control suit: Catholic flock not flocking to N.Y. cardinal

A new poll in New York, the first to test Catholic bishops’ much-ballyhooed “religious liberty” war, finds a disapproving public and divided Catholic laity on the hierarchy’s legal action against the Obama Administration.

By a 38-55 percent margin, the Quinnipiac University poll found that New York resident disapprove of the suit filed by Cardinal Timothy Dolan against the administration’s health insurance birth control mandate.

Archbishop Peter Sartain

Catholics approve of the cardinal’s suit by a narrow 51-45 percent margin. Dolan has spared no hyperbole in efforts to sell the party line.

The quotable New York cardinal recently expressed “horror” at what he described as the “strangling” exemption offered in the health insurance plan, and accused the Obama administration of “radically intruding on what the term of a church is.”

The Quinnipiac poll found that only 38 percent of New Yorkers approve of how Dolan is doing his job, with 25 percent disapproving and many undecided. The cardinal received a somewhat tepid 63 percent thumbs-up from Catholics surveyed.

The “religious liberty” theme has dominated declarations by the Catholic hierarchy across the country, and the website of the Catholic Archdiocese of Seattle.

But the bishops have forged ahead while giving Catholic laypersons and parish priests not much liberty to weigh in.

In Seattle and Tacoma, several large parishes have refused to join Archbishop J. Peter Sartain’s campaign for a vote to repeal the state’s new same-sex marriage law. As many as 200 demonstrators have gathered Tuesday nights at St. James Cathedral to protest the Vatican’s crackdown on American nuns.

The New York poll found that the bishops’ actions have a significant number of peoples’ backs up. Forty-three percent of those surveyed felt the Catholic Church is “too involved” in politics, just 11 percent “not involved enough” with 32 percent answering “about right.”

The lawsuits, filed by the Archdiocese of New York and other dioceses and Catholic institutions, challenge a provision of the Affordable Care Act. The Obama administration is requiring birth control coverage in health care plans offered to women employees.

It exempts those employed directly by churches who oppose contraception. With Catholic hospitals and universities, the administration proposes that health insurers pick up the bill for the pill.

The Quinnipiac Poll was taken May 22-28 and surveyed 1,504 adults in New York.